Tickets. Get your tickets.

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This weekend, Spouse took Peanut to an arcade museum. Pin ball machines, carnival games, and skee ball. Peanut was in heaven and has, since he came home, forced us to perform feats of skill and chance in exchange for tickets. Tape flags, really, that I gave him to get him to stop raiding my desk and (to my horror) the books I’ve flagged during my ongoing, stunted, stop-and-go research.

But that’s another story for another day.

Anyway. I’ve been bouncing balls across the room into yogurt cups for tickets. Spouse has been coaxing plastic toys through jumping contests for tickets.

And when Butter finally let go and walked on his own, Peanut counted the steps. And awarded Butter tickets for each unassisted step.

We have pages and pages like this.

Peanut is so excited to be in control.

Butter is so proud of himself it’s irresistible.

It’s a good time to be at Casa Naptime.

15 thoughts on “Tickets. Get your tickets.”

  1. Butter dude, come back, come back! He’s running away without his tickets! Is that a jetpack in his diaper?

    I take it you don’t have a [rhymes with] Sucky Cheez nearby?

  2. jc, his diaper is big enough to fit a jetpack, jetski, and jetpropulsion laboratory.
    We might have a Luck E. Sleez, but I don’t ever want to know.
    I dig unicorns and glitter, subvert my career and sense of self, and I *do not* do kids’ music, animated pizza parlors, or character-themed anything. It’s just me. Withhold my tokens if you must.

  3. I love it when real life experiences carry over into their imaginary play. In our home, it often begins in reverse. Because we don’t have a television, well known characters are made up. For example, my 5 yr old plays Super Mario with his preschool buddies, having no idea who this is. My 8 yr old played Harry Potter at recess for months with, again, no prior knowledge. I finally relented and let her read the books. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for her to revisit her play, now knowing all the details. I suppose what this proves is that children don’t need very much to engage their imagination. It really comes down to just giving them a cardboard box and seeing what they do with it. Or, in this case, post-its!

  5. How fabulous! Really sweet and wonderful. Chee chee and more chee!

    If this progresses to a ticket-to-prize system, please, in the name of sweetness and light, encourage Peanut to be as unlike Chuck E. Cheese as possible (where 1,000,000 hard-won tickets garners you one small eraser. Grrr. Srsly–Chuck SUX). ;)

  6. We took eldest to Chuck E Cheese for the first time on Thursday, his 5th birthday. He loved it. It was just as I remembered it, though — loud, dirty, and germ ridden. If it weren’t for the fact that I cannot say no to Ski Ball, we probably would have turned around and walked out. Damn me.

  7. PS. Hurray for Butter’s new skills. Don’t you love how they walk with their hands in the air for balance? So adorable.

  9. Oh, sh!t! Butter is mobile…Hold on to your tickets, Nap! Things just got REALLY interesting…My money is on Butter, by the way!

  10. We took MLH to the Dickens faire this past December and they had a game called “Boot the Cat.” Yes, you were encouraged to hurl shoes at pop-up wooden cats and rewarded generously if you succeeded in knocking the poor kitties down. Needless to say, there are no prizes for that game outside of pseudo 19th Century London.

  11. Meg you *have* to point me to the resources that let you know about such Dickensean events. The image of ML chucking footwear at cats is even better than the pet parrot story I just read.

    Maria and Jane, I agree with you both! Delicious and poised to take things up seven notches around here.

    Fie, that place creeps me out. I *adored* it as a child for skee ball, but nothing else. And since there are other ways to get tickets and games of skill, I’m trying to avoid the Cheez at all cost.

    Ink, I will work to ensure P rewards tickets with handsome and generous gifts, if he chooses to go that way. Considering Chuck’s probable profit margin, his ticket exchange ratio is reprehensible.

    Kitch, I’ll bet he has enough for two!

    MacDougal, our house is the same way. I asked P when he came home playing Batman, “what is a bat man?” He said, “You know. A man. A bat. He has wings and jumps around.” Oh. I see.

  13. Yuliya, I always say, “Well, his tutor says he’s understanding Mandarin well but still speaks with an accent, so I’m going to switch him to a language immersion program before his neural grooves are set.” It makes people shut up, which is my goal.

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